Three decades ago, international students at Harvard University made up just 11% of the total. Today, they are 26%.
Like other prestigious American educational institutions, Harvard has for years used its global fame to attract the best students. Now, the increased international enrollment has made the schools vulnerable to a new wave of attacks from US President Donald Trump, who has begun using his control of the country's borders to push for changes to American higher education.
Trump's most recent blow to Harvard is a sweeping federal law that aims to ban foreign students from entering the country to study at Harvard. Trump’s proclamation is only for Harvard, and a federal judge temporarily blocked it last night.
But Trump’s order also poses a threat to other universities that his administration has singled out as hotbeds of liberalism in need of reform. It is shaking up federally supervised campuses, including Columbia University, where 40 percent of students are foreign.
Amid the Trump administration’s increased scrutiny of new student visas last week, a group of Columbia faculty and alumni have raised concerns about Trump’s concentrated oversight powers.
“Columbia University is particularly vulnerable to this ‘scratch of the pen,’” the Stand Columbia Society’s newsletter wrote. (Stand Columbia Society).
International students make up about 6 percent of all students in the United States, but at the eight Ivy League universities, they make up 27 percent, according to an AP analysis of Department of Education data. The highest concentration is at Columbia University, where international students make up 40 percent, followed by Harvard and Cornell, with about 25 percent. Brown University has the smallest share of international students – 20%.
Other private universities that are highly selective are seeing similar trends, including Northeastern University and New York University, each of which saw international enrollment double between 2013 and 2023.
The growth at public universities is slower, but even at the 50 most elite public colleges, international students make up about 11% of the student body.
As the middle class in other countries grows, more families can afford the test prep courses and admissions counseling that will help them secure a spot in the Ivy League, said Rajika Bhandari, who runs a higher education consulting firm.
“The Ivy League brand is very strong abroad, especially in countries like India and China, where families are very familiar with the best schools. institutions in the U.S. and other competing countries“, Bhandari said in an email.
She pointed out that over the past two decades, U.S. universities have increasingly recognized the benefits of international exchange, viewing it as a key source of revenue that subsidizes American students and supports student enrollment in STEM fields – science, technology, engineering and mathematics.
American universities have been open to international students for decades, but their numbers increased around 2008, when more Chinese students began attending American universities.
This was part of the “gold rush” in higher education, said William Burstein, who has worked on the international expansion of several universities.
"Whether it was a private university or a public university, you had to be at the top to be able to claim to be the most global university," said Burstein, who led the efforts at Ohio State University and West Virginia University.
The race, he said, was driven in part by economics. International students are generally ineligible for financial aid, and at some schools, they pay much higher tuition than their American counterparts. Universities also take into account global rankings, which favor institutions with more international students, faculty and researchers.
Some wealthier universities, including Harvard, also offer financial aid to international students.
But students who get into top-ranked American universities often have the means to pay higher tuition, Burstein said. That further encourages more international students to enroll, because it frees up more scholarship funds for American students, he said.
Still, international student enrollment has not grown equally across all types of higher education institutions. Public universities often face pressure from state lawmakers to limit foreign enrollment and have more seats available for state residents. Private universities are not under that pressure, and many have been actively recruiting international students while the number of American students has remained flat. The number of American students attending college has remained flat for decades, and some have dropped out of college because of rising costs and student debt.
Supporters of international exchange say that international students contribute billions of dollars to the U.S. economy, and many continue to support the country’s technology industry and other fields in need of skilled workers. Most international students study in STEM fields.
In the Ivy League, international growth has been driven mostly by students at the master’s and doctoral levels, while the increase in undergraduate programs has been more modest. More than half of graduate students at Harvard’s Graduate School of Design and School of Government are international, as are five of Columbia’s specialized schools.
From 2013 to 2023, The number of international undergraduate students at Harvard has increased by about 100, while the number of graduate students has increased by nearly 2,000. Part of that growth can be explained by the increasing global competition in higher education, said William Kirby, a Harvard historian who has written about the evolution of higher education.
“If you're not recruiting the best international students for your most important master's and doctoral programs, especially in science and engineering, then you're not going to be competitive,” Kirby said.
The Ivy League has been able to outpace other universities in large part because of its reputation, said Burstein. He recalls trips to China and India, where he spoke with families who could list the position of every Ivy League school in the world rankings.
„This was the golden calf for these families. They really thought, "If we can get into these schools, the rest of our lives will be a breeze," he said.
Last week, Trump said he thought Harvard should cap its international student enrollment at about 15 percent.
"We have people who want to go to Harvard and other schools who can't get in because there are international students," Trump said at a news conference.
The university called Trump's recent move to ban entry to Harvard "another illegal repressive action by the administration in violation of Harvard's First Amendment rights."
In a lawsuit challenging the Trump administration's previous attempt to block international students from attending Harvard, the university said its international student population was the result of "a diligent and (continued) decades-long project" to attract the most qualified international students. Losing access to student visas would instantly harm the school's mission and reputation, Harvard said.
“In our interconnected global economy, a university that cannot welcome students from all corners of the world is at a competitive disadvantage,“ the university said.
Translated from English: Petya Dimitrova, BTA